Clare Blackburn (FRSE)
Professor of Tissue Stem Cell Biology
- Centre for Regenerative Medicine
- Institute for Regeneration and Repair
- Institute for Stem Cell Research
Contact details
- Tel: 0131 651 9500
- Email: c.blackburn@ed.ac.uk
Address
- Street
-
Centre for Regenerative Medicine
Institute for Regeneration and Repair
The University of Edinburgh
Edinburgh BioQuarter
5 Little France Drive - City
- Edinburgh
- Post code
- EH16 4UU
Background
BSc Biological Sciences (Hons Molecular Biology), University of Edinburgh, 1984
PhD Biochemistry, Imperial College of Science and Technology, London, 1991
Wellcome Trust Fellow, Walter and Eliza Hall Institute for Medical Research, Melbourne, Australia, 1991-1994
Wellcome Trust Fellow, Univeristy of Oxford, 1995-1997
Wellcome Trust Fellow, University of Edinburgh, 1997-2000
Leukaemia Research Fund Fellow then Leukaemia Research Fund Lecturer, University of Edinburgh, 2001-2011
Personal Chair 2011
Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 2015
Responsibilities & affiliations
Director of the Graduate School of Biological Sciences 2009-2013; 2017-present
Undergraduate teaching
BSc Biological Sciences
Development, Regeneration and Stem Cells Honours
- Course organiser and lecturer: Tissue and Cancer Stem Cells elective (DEBI10035)
- Lecturer: Biology of Regeneration elective (DEBI10032)
Immunology Honours
- Course organiser and lecturer: Stem Cells, Haematopoiesis and Immune Therapy elective (IMMU10011)
- Lecturer: Immunobiology core course (IMMU10001)
Genetics/ Molecular Genetics/ Molecular Biology/ Cell Biology Honours
- Lecturer: Synoptic Skills (MOGE10007)
BSc Biomedical Sciences
- Lecturer: Regenerative Medicine (BIME10017)
Postgraduate teaching
Academic lead: EASTBIO BBSRC Doctoral Training Partnership
Open to PhD supervision enquiries?
Yes
Past PhD students supervised
Paul Rouse
Dong Liu
Harsh Vaidya
Svetlana Ulyanchenko
Xin Jin
Michelle Kelly
Nick Bredenkamp
Alistair Cook
Alison Farley
Julie Sheridan
Lucy Morris
Craig Nowell
Julie Gordon
Clare Bennett
Research summary
Thymus generation and regeneration
The Blackburn lab studies the mechanisms through which the thymus develops and is maintained. We investigate the biology of thymic epithelial progenitor/stem cells and the cellular and molecular mechanisms that maintain the postnatal organ with the aim of developing rational cell replacement or regenerative strategies for boosting thymus function in order to stimulate T cell production in patients.
The Blackburn lab studies three major strands of thymus biology: development, maintenance and age-related degeneration. We are particularly interested in the regulation of epithelial progenitor/stem cells in the fetal and adult thymus. Our overarching aim is to restore thymus function in immunocompromised patients, using cell replacement or regenerative strategies based on fundamental science. We co-discovered the population of fetal tissue stem/progenitor cells from which the thymus arises during development, and demonstrated that this population can establish a properly organized, fully functional thymus upon transplantation. Recently, we showed that manipulation of a single transcription factor is sufficient to regenerate the aged thymus, even when the organ has fully degenerated. Prof Blackburn is also coordinator of the EU funded project ThymiStem.
Clare Blackburn also has a strong interest in public engagement. She leads the pan-European project EuroStemCell which links more than 90 European stem cell and regenerative medicine research labs to engage with publics about stem cell science and medicine. She has a personal interest in the use of film as a tool for public engagement in science, and has co-produced 7 documentary films including the feature-length ‘Stem Cell Revolutions’. In 2012, she was awarded the University’s Tam Dalyell Prize for Public Engagement, together with Dr Amy Hardie (Edinburgh College of Art).
Affiliated research centres
Current project grants
Blackburn, C.C., Anderson, G., Chapman, S.J., Holländer, G., Lütolf, M. Wellcome Trust Collaborative Award. Engineering a Synthetic Thymus. £3.6M, 2019-2023
-
An induced thymic epithelial cell‐based high throughput screen for thymus extracellular matrix mimetics
In:
European Journal of Immunology
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/eji.202249934
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Accepted/In press) -
Canonical notch signaling controls the early thymic epithelial progenitor cell state and emergence of the medullary epithelial lineage in fetal thymus development
In:
Development
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1242/dev.178582
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Contact us for more information: an analysis of public enquiries about stem cells
(14 pages)
In:
Regenerative medicine, vol. 14, pp. 1137-1150
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2217/rme-2019-0092
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
Expression of Plet1 controls interstitial migration of murine small intestinal dendritic cells
(12 pages)
In:
European Journal of Immunology, vol. 49, pp. 290-301
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/eji.201847671
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Reply to jiménez-alonso et al., schooling and zhao, and mortazavi: Further discussion on the immunological model of carcinogenesis
In:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), vol. 115, pp. E4319-E4321
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1802809115
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Letter (Published) -
Thymic involution and rising disease incidence with age
(6 pages)
In:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), vol. 115, pp. 1883-1888
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1714478115
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
IL-17A-Induced PLET1 Expression Contributes to Tissue Repair and Colon Tumorigenesis
(10 pages)
In:
The Journal of Immunology, vol. 199, pp. 3849-3857
DOI: https://doi.org/10.4049/jimmunol.1601540
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Special focus issue on regenerative medicine in society: interdisciplinary perspectives (part II) - Foreword
(4 pages)
In:
Regenerative medicine, vol. 12, pp. 733-736
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2217/rme-2017-0136
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Special issue (Published) -
Special focus issue on regenerative medicine in society: interdisciplinary perspectives (part I) - Foreword
(4 pages)
In:
Regenerative medicine, vol. 12, pp. 577-580
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2217/rme-2017-0117
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
EuroStemCell: A European infrastructure for communication and engagement with stem cell research
In:
Seminars in Cell and Developmental Biology
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.semcdb.2017.08.006
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (E-pub ahead of print) -
Marketing of unproven stem cell-based interventions: A call to action
In:
Science Translational Medicine, vol. 9
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/scitranslmed.aag0426
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Initial seeding of the embryonic thymus by immune-restricted lympho-myeloid progenitors
(14 pages)
In:
Nature Immunology, vol. 17, pp. 1424 - 1437
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ni.3576
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
FOXN1 in thymus organogenesis and development
In:
European Journal of Immunology
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/eji.201545814
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Development of thymic epithelial cells
(13 pages)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-374279-7.04015-7
Research output: › Chapter (Published) -
Identification of a bipotent epithelial progenitor population in the adult thymus
(14 pages)
In:
Cell Reports, vol. 14, pp. 2819–2832
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2016.02.080
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Foxn1 Is Dynamically Regulated in Thymic Epithelial Cells during Embryogenesis and at the Onset of Thymic Involution
In:
PLoS ONE, vol. 11, pp. e0151666
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0151666
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Construction of a functional thymic microenvironment from pluripotent stem cells for the induction of central tolerance
(13 pages)
In:
Regenerative medicine, vol. 10, pp. 317-29
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2217/rme.15.8
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Literature review (Published) -
An organized and functional thymus generated from FOXN1-reprogrammed fibroblasts
(15 pages)
In:
Nature Cell Biology, vol. 16, pp. 902-908
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ncb3023
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Letter (Published) -
Regeneration of the aged thymus by a single transcription factor
(11 pages)
In:
Development, vol. 141, pp. 1627-1637
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1242/dev.103614
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Serum-free culture of mid-gestation mouse embryos: A tool for the study of endoderm-derived organs
(12 pages)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-60327-292-6-12
Research output: › Chapter (Published)
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
Bloodwise
European Union
Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research
Medical Research Council
Wellcome Trust
Prof Graham Anderson, University of Birmingham
Professor Georg Hollander, University of Oxford
Professor Jon Chapman, University of Oxford
Professor Matthias Lütolf, EPFL, Lausanne
Prof Nancy Manley, University of Georgia, Athens, USA